Here Come the Videofreex

Mar 25 Rhinebeck

Fri

3/25

8:15

Mar 26 Woodstock

Sat

3/26

5:00

In the late 1960s and 1970s, a group of renegade journalists known as the Videofreex democratized the future of the media as they deployed the first handheld video cameras to report and observe the world around them.Today, thanks to cell phones, the ability to shoot video footage anywhere and anytime is taken for granted, but 45 years ago the means of video communication were controlled by the TV networks.IN PERSON: Parry Teasdale, a founding member of the Videofreex, was also deeply involved with Lanesville TV, one of the first pirate TV stations, throughout the 1970s. Parry Teasdale in Rhinebeck Friday March 25, evening at 8:15 & in Woodstock, Sat March 26, 5:00. Filmmakers Jon Nealon and Jenny Raskin tap into a treasure chest of restored tapes shot by the Freex, including interviews with icons like murdered Black Panther Fred Hampton and legendary activist Abbie Hoffman, charting the path of this underground video collective from their assignment on the counterculture beat for CBS News to their rupture with the network and creation of a radical pirate television station in Lanesville, a small towwn in upstate New York. A premonition of what happens when the people craft the news, it captures the pure enthusiasm and revolutionary use of technology as the Freex changed the nature of journalism through the power of portable video, forging a legacy that has evolved to become today’s all-access media environment.IN PERSON: Parry Teasdale, a founding member of the Videofreex, was also deeply involved with Lanesville TV, one of the first pirate TV stations, throughout the 1970s. Parry Teasdale in Rhinebeck Friday March 25, 8:15; in Woodstock, Sat March 26, 5:00.